Rant #2,436: Let's Pretend

Regarding yesterday's Rant, I stand by it 100 percent, 1,000 percent, 1,000,000 percent.

That race car driver, Bubba Wallace, is the latest purveyor of "let's pretend," where one thing equals another as long as the end justifies the means--regardless of whether it has any hint of reality or not.

The driver has now become the darling of television, appearing on more shows that he had ever appeared on before, persisting in his lies and drivel and acting as if he was going for an Oscar nomination.

So of course he winds up on the CBS Morning News, interviewed by fellow racist Gayle King, who nearly broke down in tears when he told her about his plight, a plight that the FBI said, after through investigation using the resources of more than a dozen of their agents, never happened.

Wallace contends that the FBI is wrong, that it was a noose planted in his garage as a racist "message," but even he admits that he never saw the supposed noose, that it was reported to NASCAR and the FBI by a lot attendant, and that NASCAR actually called him into their offices and alerted him about the possible racist symbol without doing a thorough investigation of their own.

Now, either Wallace is a true moron or he is trying to put one over on us all.

Look, he is not a NASCAR rookie; he should know that a garage door pull is; and he should know that what is commonly referred to as a noose is, in fact, a tie knot that is commonly used not for lynching purposes or as a symbol of hatred, but as a simple knot that is widely used for things that have absolutely nothing to do with hatred.

Being that he has been driving for several years, he must have seen this knot being used before, and never determined that it was used for racial hatred ... until the other day.

Heck, maybe he is not as dumb as I thought he was ...

This is what I wrote about this idiotic, repugnant incident on Facebook yesterday, and it holds as true as can be:

"He now says he never saw the supposed noose, that a race attendant saw it and brought it up to officials, who decided WITHOUT ANY EVIDENCE that it was based on racism and called him in so they could apologize to him. What ensued was a big brouhaha over nothing. A noose is a knot, but it doesn't mean it was a racist symbol. 

In lieu of the circumstances, all parties got what they wanted: the driver, who now had a solid platform to stand on in the midst of all the racial fervor in our country now; NASCAR, which now has the word out that they took care of this, after being dragged through the coals due to the presence of Confederate flags at their races; and the FBI, which doesn't have to look into another non-existent crime like the Smollett case. 

The driver and attendant should both be disciplined, and/or apologize to the racing community for their indiscretions, but that will never happen. I would not be surprised if this wasn't fully orchestrated like the Smollett case was, but we will probably never find out."

Repugnant, absolutely repugnant, that Wallace and NASCAR can get away with this nonsense, but not only will they get away with it, they will certainly prosper from it, which makes it even worse.

Of course, social media either lined up behind Wallace or rallied against him. I even heard a rumor, and again, it is only a rumor and I am reporting it here as such, that the entire parade the NASCAR drivers had to support Wallace, a video shown around the world to show solidarity with the driver's plight, was also staged. Drivers were told to participate, and many did not do it by their own decision, as they were smart enough to see through this charade.

Again, this is only a rumor, nothing more, but would anyone put it past NASCAR to do something like this after what we know now?

And then we have the "let's pretend" governors for the ages, Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York and Governor Phil Murphy of New Jersey, who are so engrossed with pleasing people that they feel need to be pleased that they are stumbling over themselves to brown nose everything with a dollar sign attached to it.

The latest nonsense is that they, and the governor of Connecticut, have joined together to put a travel isolation rule on those coming to their area if they come from states with a high surge in coronavirus cases, such as Florida and Arizona.

Those visiting New York, New Jersey or Connecticut from these high surge states must self-quarantine for 14 days, and if it is found that they did not, they are putting themselves in the position for fines of anywhere from $1,000 to $10,000 for their infraction.

Number one, how are they going to enforce this rule? Are they going to look at lists of people who use air travel to get to those states and look at cell phone records to see who quarantined and who didn't? Are they going to have traffic stops at their borders to check papers?

And to get to my point about how the New York and New Jersey governors are playing a serious game of 'let's pretend," New York Governor Cuomo has decided that Major League Baseball teams are exempt from this ruling--even though 1) many of their players are coming to New York State for their spring training at both Yankee Stadium and CitiField from states with the highest surges; and 2) when the season begins, the Yankees and Mets will be playing teams from the current centers of the virus, such as Florida and Georgia.

Cuomo claims that these people will be vigorously tested, so they are exempt ... and that leads us to Governor Murphy of New Jersey, who buys into all of this and is now questioning why President Trump should be allowed to have a rally in the Garden State.

Well, the last time I looked, the President was being as vigorously tested as the baseball players were, but I guess that doesn't count when you are a Democratic governor and the President is a Republican.

I guess the testing is different for Republicans and ballplayers, I don't know.

But what I do know is that this all has to do with money, as does the NASCAR situation.

With money down, with states bordering on bankruptcy, with organizations losing their hide during this pandemic, EVERYTHING has to do with money ... and yes, EVERYTHING has to do with politics, too.

Heck, my wife can't even see her father in the Veterans Home in person, but if she wanted to, she could get a tattoo. It costs money to get your body tattooed, which translates to tax money, but it costs nothing--but means everything in the world, and is priceless--to see your elderly loved ones.

And don't get me started on the thugs who want to rip down every statue in creation as long as it features a white face. They are trying to rewrite history to their own agendas, and they live in some alternate universe where everything matches their "let's pretend" world and has nothing to do with historical reality.

Yes, we are in the "let's pretend" stage of our American life now, and this is accepted by just so many people as being the real deal.

It isn't, and it is time for people to stand up to this nonsense and say something about it, and why it is just so wrong.

I guess I did just that in my own simple way.